'Middle East' Category Archives

A senior United Nations official warns some 20,000 civilians held hostage by Islamic State in the Syrian city of Raqqa are in great danger and everything possible must be done to help them escape. The special adviser to the U.N. special envoy for Syria, Jan Egeland, Thursday said the needs of thousands of civilians trapped […]

A “deadly labyrinth” trapping civilians who are coming under fire from all sides, is how Amnesty International describes the streets of Raqqa in Syria. The human rights group says that hundreds have been killed and injured as the battle to recapture the self-proclaimed Islamic State’s main stronghold reaches a decisive phase. Its “new report|“https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde24/6945/2017/en/ , […]

WASHINGTON — Despite President Donald Trump’s warm embrace of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi, the United States has held back a substantial amount of foreign aid because of the country’s human rights abuses. State Department officials said Wednesday that around $195 million was held in abeyance and another $100 million redirected to other entities. Egypt […]

A North Korean mining firm, reputed to be a front for Pyongyang’s weapons development programs, attempted to ship materiel to Syrian officials tied to the country’s chemical weapons program, according to a confidential United Nations assessment of international sanctions against the North. Details of the U.N. findings, first reported by Reuters, found officials from Korea […]

The Syrian President said on Sunday his country had scuppered Western attempts to topple him. Bashar Assad said Syria, with the help of Russia, has confronted those endeavours. He was speaking in Damascus at a government and diplomatic meeting at the country’s foreign ministry. “In Syria we have paid high price for the failed talks…but […]

The Lebanese army has launched an offensive against an Islamic State enclave on Lebanon’s northeast border with Syria. The armed group Hezbollah simultaneously announced an assault on the militants from the Syrian side of the border. Both operations are aimed at Islamic State militants in the western Qalamoun region of Syria, an area across the […]

ASSOCIATED PRESS BAGHDAD | Iraq’s Shiite militias announced Monday they will participate in the next major battle against the Islamic State group after the Iraqi forces’ victory in Mosul last month. The Shiite militias, who have had historically close ties to the Shiite regime in Iran, did not fight in the urban part of Mosul, […]

In spite of the well documented tensions between the two countries; guards from India and Pakistan offered sweets and goodwill at the Attari-Wagah Border to mark the Independence Day of the two nations. The traditional exchange of gifts has played an important role in reducing ill feeling between the two countries. India’s independence from Britain […]

The U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee has voted to advance the Taylor Force Act, which would halt U.S. taxpayer subsidies to the Palestinian Authority until it stops a “Pay to Slay” practice through which terrorists and their families are rewarded financially. The international community has raised the issue because of the hundreds of millions of […]

Pakistan is celebrating 70 years of independence from its former colonial ruler Britain. The day began with a 21-gun salute in the federal capital, Islamabad, a ceremony repeated in all provincial capitals. In Karachi, a change of Guard also took place at the mausoleum of Pakistan’s founder Mohammed Ali Jinnah, popularly known as “Quaid-e-Azam” (Supreme […]

“The Middle East is the graveyard of predictions” notes the left-wing writer and editor Adam Shatz. That’s partly because it’s so volatile (no one in 2014 imagined the revival of an executive caliphate after 11 centuries) and it’s perverse (Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan started a near-civil war against the Kurds to win constitutional powers […]